


Scale

by QDS



Category: Love/Hate - Fandom
Genre: F/M, Non Consensual, Power Dynamics, Power Play, Shillelagh, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-09
Updated: 2011-09-09
Packaged: 2017-10-23 14:00:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/251092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QDS/pseuds/QDS
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darren may be worried about Mary's safety, but Mary can look after herself...and take matters into her own hands. But John Boy Power isn't a man to fucked with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scale

**Author's Note:**

> **Content notes:** Very adult, with depiction of non-consensual sex, and some mindfucking of a very Catholic variety. This is a dark fic where the non-con elements go both ways for the characters. Please be mindful of that before reading. Also, 'creative' uses of a shillelagh. Note that in context to the above
> 
>  **Additional notes:** Spoilers for the entirety of the first season of _Love/Hate_. Pronunciation guide: cailín – means lass or girl, pronounced like the name Colleen (but think of it with an Irish accent); shillelagh – pronounced 'shi-LAY-lee', traditionally a walking stick that could also be used as a cudgel or club, often made from blackthorn. Craic – pronounced 'crack'. Basically 'having a good time', 'having a bit of a laugh.'

*

The dead sometimes haunt the living. This Mary knows. Unquiet spirits whose state of being won't allow them to move on, who need peace, or reassurance, or justice.

But when she looks at John Boy, what she sees is a living spectre. The smooth hair is too even in colour, his skin too tight across his cheeks. On another man it would be a pathetic sign of an unwillingness to age with grace. But on John Boy, with his pale flesh that in a certain light seems to glow, with his smug, reassured mouth and his flowing steps, it only adds to the quiet terror and power he wrought.

At first, he made her shudder. His opaque eyes followed her at Trish's wedding like a lazy hunter biding his time, his lips pursed on the verge of another taunting air kiss. He had always frightened her, but it was the first she felt it deep in her bones.

But as the life support beeps and Darren's eyes stay closed, his expression fixed at the point of death, Mary's guts twist against the fear, turning it to unbidden rage. And the only question remains; how do you kill a ghost?

*

She goes to Tommy's first. Darren left his gear there; after Hughie and Elmo tried to gun him down, he said he couldn't risk something happening outside her house, or worse, in it. Because Mary never kept anything more deadly than a kitchen knife in her house. At least nothing that was considered an illegal weapon.

When Tommy greets her at the door, he tries to kiss her neck, all innocently making out that it was a kind of comfort, intimacy over shared, suspended grief, for how can you grieve when you don't know if someone will live or die? Mary brushes him off, and he leaves, looking childish and glum.

Alone in the guest room, Mary opens drawers and bags. She finds Darren's gun, not very well hidden at the bottom of his cupboard, but ignores it.

When she turns to the bed, Mary sees the scapular hanging on his bedside lamp. It grabs her by the throat. She heaves back a sob, and a sharp prick of anger towards Darren stabs her chest. Why didn't he have it on? He doesn't believe in anything, she knows, but...he knew how important it was to her. He _knew_. Idiot.

She lifts it delicately with her finger tips. The string trembles, the two pieces of stiffen cloth jerking up and down. Only when Mary slips it over her head and tucks it under her dress, allowing one piece of cloth to drop between her breasts, and the other down her back, do her hands stop shaking.

Mary puts her hand to the piece that sits on her chest. She closes her eyes. _Its meant to protect you_ , she said to Darren. She prays for it's protection, that it put a barrier between her and her enemies. Then she resumes her search, calmer than before.

It's under the bed, in arms reach if she were lying down, that she finds the shillelagh.

She sits on the edge of the bed, holding it in both hands. It's made from the traditioanl blackthorn, but it's short, something to be carried in the hand rather than a walking stick turned weapon. The nobbly knots are raised humps but polished over so they're smooth to touch. It's the size of a slender flashlight, and about as heavy. She shifts it, holding the narrower end, allowing the thickened end with its slight curve to weigh down a little.

It feels safer than a knife or a gun. She's only trusts knives for cutting food, and Darren and Robbie once took her to a shooting gallery, but that ended with her dropping the pistol, shocked by the recoil. You can't control that kind of a weapon. The shillelagh, however, could be the extension of her arm. And it will fit neatly in her handbag.

*

Elmo opens the door to John Boy's apartment. He's surprised, but shows her no ill will. Mary does not return the favour; she keeps her face hard. She had to buzz to get into the building. It's not like he shouldn't have been expecting her. Still, he winces when he leads her down the corridor, and she realises that not so long ago he was almost in Darren's place.

Mary has never been here before. The apartment is all white and blues and glass. All ice. A perfect lair for a cold-blooded bastard. The only change is the wall of green in the kitchen. Green as a shamrock, as Irish as Guinness and too much rain.

In the open planned space, Nidge is waving his arms and making declarations about some kind of malarkey that went down during some...well, she doesn't really care. When he sees her, he stops right still. His hand slides behind his neck, gripping it as his legs lock around each other.

"Alright, Mary?"

"Oh, I'm grand, Nidge. Just grand." She sets her mouth in a thin line.

Nidge puts on that best fake smile of his, one that actually manages to reach in his eyes but always shows his nervousness.

"Just having a bit of craic here."

Mary doesn't respond to that. Elmo sidles towards the dining table, hands in his pockets. There is some other kid there, flopped back on the couches, but Mary doesn't recognise him.

John Boy stands near the pool table. A cue rests across his back, hooked elbows holding it there, like a spear in waiting. He's wearing grey sweat pants, and a tight black vest.

"You're looking well, Mary."

He's looking at her as if she's naked, and enjoying her embarrassment. She wore a plain blue dress, loose fitting. She becomes aware of the exposed skin just above her breast. Resisting the urge to put her hand over it, she says;

"Can I have a word with you, John Boy?"

He nods, motioning for her to continue. Mary grips her handbag tightly, knowing he's being deliberately dense.

"Alone."

John Boy smirks, his thin upper lip flattening out in a reptilian fashion. Mary swallows, not from fear, but from the icky shudders that creeps down her spine.

John Boy nods, and whips the cue around, and points it at the fellas, a sweeping arc between them. "Find something else to do. All of you."

Mary looks sharply at Nidge. The kid scampers off, and Elmo shuffles out behind her. Nidge seems to hang in the air, as if he's unclear on the definition of 'all of you.' It doesn't take him long though, with Mary glaring at him, to get the hint. He mumbles a 'see you', and soon Mary hears the door close.

Leaving her alone. With John Boy.

He invites her to sit at the dining table. She lowers herself to a chair, not settling back into it, but staying alert on the edge. She squeezes the handbag in her lap. John Boy saunters away from the pool table, cue clattering to it's surface, and he sits opposite her, leaning back, legs apart, arm draped over the back of his chair, and that damn smug smile still there. Mary forces one back at him, tightening her lips.

John Boy gestures for her to speak. "Go on."

"Darren's on life support. He's stable, though. The doctors are keep the infections at bay. Still..." She's rehearsed this part, but only in her head. The words are a little choked. "They don't know if he will wake up."

His mouth hardens. Mary didn't know what to expect; that he'd look triumphant, or pleased. A small part of her is glad he has at least a shred of decency to look troubled by it.

"I was sorry to hear about Darren." John Boy leans forward, threading his fingers on the table. "But I didn't have anything to do with it."

Mary shakes her head, the anger flowing back. "Oh, you had something to do with it, alright. Because when the ambulance crew showed up and peeled him off the pavement, they caught a couple of words. One of them was 'Stumpy.' They tell me some of them couldn't help themselves, they had a giggle about it, 'cos it sounds like nonsense. Unless you know."

John Boy shakes his head. "Mary...I didn't send him to do anything. I had a fucking funeral to organise. Was sending a hit crew out high on your list at Robbie's funeral?"

Mary slams the table with her palm. "Don't you dare mention--"

"Oh your fucking family!" John Boy surges to his feet, arching across the table at her. She jerks back, instinctively, but she holds still when she remembers that it might be seen as weak.

John Boy sneers, shaking his head."You and Darren both...you think your brother was more than mine? Worth more? Deserved to die less? That your family is better than mine?" His head juts forward, turning a little, and she thinks of a lizard in the grass. "As if you didn't feel any satisfaction when you heard about Hughie."

Mary starts. She is aware that she's blinking at John Boy, aware of a small burn of shame in her chest, and John Boy sees it too, and he eases back, victorious and smug once again.

"Like you're all such good people. Who just happen to deal in coke. That just happens to fuck people up."

"I never did," she whispers, knowing it sounds pathetic.

"But you enjoyed the fruits of it, the money, the clothes it can buy you--"

"The life it can get for my kids," she snaps.

"For family," he says.

Mary meets his eyes. They are like blue marbles, hard and opaque.

As she speaks, Mary stands, little by little. "Alright, John Boy. Alright. We're no better than you. Fine. We've both lost a brother. I might lose another one. You wanted to stop Darren from killing Hughie, even though you knew what he did, fine. I can see that. So now that I know who shot my brother, you know how it feels to be in my shoes. We know you helped Stumpy after he battered Rosemarie, after he killed the baby inside her."

She hopes the last dig will cut him, but he's not responding. She continues.

"Let's say that you didn't have anything to do with him shooting Darren. But let's say Stumpy came running to you again afterwards. Or let's say you've heard where he's gotten to, because you have ears all over the place, John Boy. I'm not asking you to help me. All I want to know is where he is. The rest I can take care of myself."

Across the table, John Boy cocks his head.

"I'm curious, Mary. How do you plan to take care of him yourself?"

She clutches her handbag to her. "I have my ways."

"I'm sure you do." John Boy crosses his arms, examining her again, though this time with a little more inquiry than lechery. "Why should I just give you that information?"

"So it can end."

"And you think that no one will come after you or Darren once Stumpy is gone? Like one more death and it will all be over?" He shakes his head, dismissive. "It doesn't end. Not like that. Darren was stupid to come home. That's when he ended it, when he left."

Mary refuses to hear the sense in what he's saying. She's standing on a precipice of rage and grief; on either side is blood. "And what about my own satisfaction?"

He shifts back, his expression almost impressed. Like she's learning. Her eye twitches; she's not like him. She's _nothing_ like him.

"Satisfaction?" The tip of his tongue darts between his teeth, and he looks her up and down; her teeth clamp together. "Maybe if you took off your dress, and let me give you a proper seeing to, I'll give you that _satisfaction_."

Bile fills Mary's throat, and she reaches into her handbag. She drops the bag on the table as she reveals the shillelagh. John Boy is surprised, by only momentarily.

"I could make you tell me," she spits.

John Boy press his lips together to hold back a laugh, but he barks it out, then descends into chuckles, points at the shillelagh in her hand.

"With that! You can make me with that? Is that what you are going to get Stumpy with too? Oh Mary, you're a funny girl." He turns from her, heading towards the couches. "Get out and quit bothering me with this shite."

Her feet move before she can think. She's upon John Boy, fast, and swings the shillelagh back. It connects with his head, blunt and hard, and John Boy stumbles, hands splaying out to catch himself on the pool table. He cries out, tries to stand to defend himself, but Mary brings it down across his back, and he slips. He clings to the pool table, knuckles turning whiter than the rest of his hands.

John Boy whips around, snarling. "You little--"

Mary whips the shillelagh to his jaw. Wood connects with bone, and quivers up the length to Mary's hand, and John Boy's head whirls back to the table.

"Fuck..." he moans.

Mary stands behind him, and her body starts to shake. She's never done that before, never hit someone with her hand, let alone a weapon. She used to her body feeling soft, and tender, not rock-like, not full of ferocity. Not like Hughie must have when he shot Robbie, not like Darren when he beat up Stumpy. She always thought she understood her brother; she briefly wonders what depths of him she's never seen. Refused to see.

She steps closer to him, and shoves the shillelagh down on his back, holding him in place.

"You going to tell me, John Boy?"

John Boy pants, legs limply trying to stand.

"I doubt you can beat me any worse than I've been done before. Go on. I'm sure it will be a challenge."

John Boy glances over his shoulder. Even though he smirks at her, out of the corner of his mouth is a thin line of blood, red paint against his plaster coloured skin.

Mary grips the shillelagh tighter. She had thought she could kill him. Thought that her rage was enough, that it would propel her hand and arm with such force to hurt him. Oh, the blood on his lips was her doing, and heat fills the space behind her eyes, which should be shame, but instead is pride. Yet he's still there, grinning, skull-like.

Pain, she realises, is not enough, and death too quick.

John Boy is bent over. As his tries to stand, his arse rises in the air. The sleazy words he said before filter back through her mind, and Mary looks at the shillelagh, the length, the thickness. Her own mouth opens as the idea seeps into her brain, but she can't unthink it, can't pretend she didn't have the thought.

Can't pretend that it's not appealing in its awfulness.

Mary grabs the edge of his vest with both hands, and tugs it up over his head and part of his arms, but instead of taking it off she pulls it back down, dragging his arms with it, so they are trapped by the material behind his shoulders. She does it so fast John Boy doesn't have time to resist. His arms are twisted like broken branches of a white birch. Above his head, they form a cage over his face.

She is about to continue when she sees the tattoo on his back. She reads the words, and she starts. _Only God Can Judge Me_.

Mary swallows, and she silently prays for the truth of those words. Lest she be judged for what she's about to do.

"What are you doing?" John Boy's trying to make his voice soft and dangerous, but right now, he is no threat.

She yanks down his sweat pants to just above his knees. There are no boxers or briefs. Just his exposed lily-white arse, his shuddering thighs, and his cock and balls hanging between his legs.

"What...the fuck...are you doing?" His voice is hollow, demonic, but beneath it she hears fear.

Mary leans down, grinding her body to his, to taste that fear. This close to him, she can smell his skin. But the scent is clean, fresh, and only that. The lack of musky maleness, the saltiness of the body, is as strange as anything else about John Boy.

"I think you know."

He struggles under her, but she digs the shillelagh into his side where it might hit a kidney, and he whimpers.

Mary eases back, now to look at John Boy bare back, arse, and thighs. So white, that in the neon lit room, it makes him almost blue. Almost glowing. The kind of skin that makes you want to touch it, to discover if it's smooth, or soft, or sexy. That startles her, disgusts her, _thrills_ her. And unlike before, when she thought of him as a haunting demon who would have vanished if she touched him, the muscles of his back, the curve where his arse cheeks begin, and the firmness of his thighs, all speak of a solid form. Something – someone – who can be hurt.

She sweeps down his back and over his arse and thighs with her finger nails. John Boy's skin like marble, yet tender, supple. Vulnerable. Mary could do whatever the fuck she wants to him. She gets hot between her legs, knowing that right now, she will.

Tucking the shillelagh under her arm, Mary ducks a fraction, her hands parting the place where his cheeks meet. John Boy's legs start to flail, try to kick out, but she steps between them, spreading them wider, soon revealing the pink pucker of his hole.

"Mary...don't be stupid."

No attempt to bully her. A plea to her intelligence. She spits twice on her fingers, and daubs it on his hole. To make it easier for her. Not for him.

When she pushes in the head of the shillelagh, he resists all the way. John Boy's hips twist, thighs shaking, but the vest holds his arms, Mary has one hand on his back, and her legs pressed against his. He groans, his neck arching up, little by little, as the length goes deeper and deeper. His neck muscles are pulsing, shaking, and she stops when her fists meets the line of his arse.

John chokes out his words. "You...fucking...bitch!"

She twists her hand, and his body tries to scrunch inwards, eyes tightly shut.

"Don't call me a bitch," she whispers.

He opens his eyes, and sneers. "How about 'cunt' then?"

Mary pumps the shillelagh in three times, each making him twist one way or another.

"Jesus, you stupid – "

She starts to make another hitch upwards, and he stops speaking.

"At least you understand that," she mutters. "Now understand that I will stop when you tell me what I want to know."

John Boy grimaces, but he says nothing.

Mary pulls the shillelagh out, just a little, and then thrusts it back in again. John Boy cries out, and he rocks on the table.

"I can keep going as long as it takes."

This time she press down. And this time, John Boy moans so deeply it goes right through her body, straight to her clit. She feels herself respond with a sound of her own, taking her by surprise, startling her.

"Mary...please...stop..."

Downward again, and he writhes like a cut snake, biting his lip, making it as red as the blood already at his mouth.

"Not...until..you...give...me...what...I...want." She punctuates each word with a thrust, and John Boy tries to swallow his ensuing moans.

On the last one, her wrist pulls back and drops a little, and something soft brushes against it. Mary peers down between John Boy's legs, and she sees his cock is hard, bobbing as she jerks into his body. She gasps, knowing that John Boy's whimpers are not entirely from pain.

Experimentally she pushes up, which just makes him twitch. But when she pushes down, his cock pulses, and he moans like he's desperate.

"Mary..." Her name is strangled out. His skin is beginning to flush, the blue and white turning pink.

"You like this, John Boy? You like something hard up your arse?"

John Boy spits, the gob only landing on the green material near him, but he doesn't speak.

Another shove, another moan. Her cheeks flush, and she tingles all over. She could hurt him – badly, really mess him up – if she wanted to.

Through her dress, she touches the scapular. The image printed on it comes to her mind; St Michael the Archangel, defeating the Devil, the great dragon, underfoot and with a spear. Now she too rises as the thought of her power, what she could do to John Boy, surges through her. Her hands shake for an instant, but then her body hardens, her shoulder straighten. She's always prayed to her namesake, the Virgin Mother, sought her softness and piety and devotion to claim as her own. Mary feels her softness leaving, her shape morphing into that of a conqueror, a warrior. The shillelagh is her spear, and John Boy beneath her is the great dragon, the serpent of old. Who held the apples of temptation for her brothers, to Nidge, to Stumpy. Mary thinks of Robbie, now safe in heaven, but whose time on earth was far too short, and of Darren, who may be joining him. And she is assured of the righteousness of what she is doing. She, like Michael, delivering justice.

One finger drops to his cock, and she brushes over it, gently, testing. It's utterly engorged, very red, the foreskin pulled back over the head, making it almost purple. Mary's nipples begin to peak and push against the material of her dress, even through her bra, and her chest contracts, sending a gratifying shiver through her. She's never thought of John Boy like this, never has her body reacted to him like this, but with him bent over, curled around himself, his arse speared with the shillelagh, he seems...beautiful. Sexy. Fuckable. And she's fucking him right now, with the shillelagh, with her hand.

Mary has only ever been fucked. Even when she's straddled a man, he's always been in control. Tommy was gentle, so much that it was always like making love. She wasn't in love with him, but it was sweet, tender.

With John Boy below her, tenderness is far from her mind. She wants to ride him, pound into him, but the wood in her hand has limits, and she's stunned that she actually wishes the shillelagh was attached to her so she could feel his arousal, this pathetic arousal that he's so clearly hating, with her whole body. With her cunt, with her pulsing clit. Until then, she never understood the pleasure to be had in power, but with John Boy's completely in her hands, she knows.

"Mary...oh God...please Mary..." His voice is wretched, like scratching nails on a blackboard.

"You're as hard as a rock, John Boy." Mary slowly rubs the shillelagh down, and John Boy whimpers, eyes shutting, and he looks on the verge of tears. But Mary knows in the deeper moments of sex, that it can be all too much that your body wants to cry out, to sob. "I think there is something that you want."

Mary's hand leaves his back, and for a moment he twitches on the table, but when Mary cups his balls, and squeezes, the round sacs like two overripe peaches, he stops, and makes a keening, animalistic sound.

"So now we both want something. You tell me what I want to know..." Mary pushes down, squeezes again, and John Boy judders. "Then I'll let you come."

She looks at his face through the cage of his hands, see the dark hair matting on his forehead. His pale features are tense but tremulous, weighing up her offer, and she knows why he wants to say no. The humiliation of what she's doing to him. The fact that he's probably never taken it like this before, never been fucked, only ever fucked himself. That makes her grin, though she knows it shouldn't, and when he gasps out a yes, her smile widens.

John Boy gives her the details, his voice quiet. Humbled. She has him repeat it several times, until she's memorised the address. When he's done, John Boy's hips don't twist away from her, but towards her, towards the shillelagh, trying to impale it further on his arse.

Mary pumps down, squeezes a few more times, but when his moans are constant, beseeching, she slowly pulls the shillelagh out, and lets go of his balls.

Confusion falls on his face. "What..."

"I said I'd let you come. Didn't say I'd do it myself."

Mary quickly goes to the kitchen, and shoves the shillelagh under the tap. Behind her, John Boy swears, curses her, all the words he couldn't say before when she had it up his arse. Bitch, cunt, fucking whore. She hears him shuffle about; she has to be quick now.

But when Mary puts it back in her bag, when she turns to see him, John Boy's vest is off, and he's pulling up his sweat pants. His face is twisted, his lips sharp and thin. Mary screams, and she runs for the corridor, to the front door, as fast as she can.

But her dress is too tight around her thighs, and though her heels are low, she still skids on the tiles in her haste. She grabs the door handle, wrenches open the door...

Too late. John Boy slams it closed, her fingers almost being jammed in it, and she yelps. No time to panic, as John Boy uses his body to shove her back against the door. He grabs her jaw, forcing her to look at him. His mouth is a perfect snarl. He's no longer frightened. The only thing aroused in him is rage.

Slowly, he leans into her, his knee pressing between her legs, spreading them apart. As he rubs, upwards, brushing against her wet knickers, he says with deep menace;

"Your turn."

*

On the bed, Mary stares at the ceiling, taking deep breaths through her nose, exhaling through her mouth. She must stay relaxed, mustn't let the panic overtake her. But each foot and each wrist is bound, and John Boy is at the foot of the bed, fingers playing at the knot of bone on her right ankle. She's naked, but for the scapular. That he left on.

Mary fought all the way, but John Boy's slenderness belied his strength. Fingers in her hair, pulling at the roots, he dragged her down the corridor. When she leaned back, crying out at the pain and wanting to be free, he slapped her three times. The sting disorientated her, and she tripped along side him, all the way into the bedroom, where he threw her face down onto the bed.

 _The sheets are dark grey..._ That was the a strange thought she had as John Boy pulled her dress up, not taking it off though as he unbuckled her shoes, pulled down her knickers, unhooked her bra. Her knickers stayed past her knees, the dress covering her head so she can't see anything, and John Boy let go for a moment. She tried to stand, grab at her dress, as she heard a drawer being opened and shut, but John Boy was back on her, fast, hauling her further up on the bed, flipping her over, tearing the dress off. He divested her of her underwear. She tried to batter him with her fists, but an open palm to her chest was enough to keep her down.

Then he grabbed her right hand, and she saw what was he'd pulled out of the draw; black cord.

John Boy tied her to the four posts with frightening speed. Wrists first, then ankles. It was her right ankle that she fought the hardest. Her legs shuddered with the struggle to stop him, to keep her legs pressed together, but John Boy gripped her right calf, and soon prised them apart. Wide, open, exposed. Cool air wafted down her pubic hair and still wet cunt, and as he tied her to the last post, she whimpered.

Now Mary twists her wrists around the binds on her hands, trying to reach the knots with her fingers, but she only brushes the cord with her nail. John Boy snickers. She glares at him. His upper lip has that bemused, mocking curl.

John Boy strokes the round bone on her ankle. "I've done this before. Though normally they don't fight so much."

Mary tries to tug at the binds, but she can scarcely move. Her whole body is taut, a rubber band ready to spring. She's never felt so naked.

"It will be better if you relaxed more." John Boy runs a nail down the line of her instep. "But you actually look rather lovely, all tensed up like that."

He's enjoying her fear. On that realisation, the worse kind of horror movies she's seen come to her, the tales of serial killers and what they did to their victims. She can't stop her chin trembling, or the sob bursting from her mouth. She closes her eyes, unable to look at him.

"You're scared. Mary?" The weight of the bed shifts as he kneels, right next to her chest. "What are you scared of?"

Her eyes are water, and she can't open them, but her voice stays strong as she says, "I suppose asking you to kill me quickly is too much."

John Boy cups her cheek, and with his thumb wipes the tears away. "Oh Mary. I'm not going to kill you. Or hurt you. Ok, maybe a little, but not like that. Are you thinking I'll start carving you up like a piece of meat?"

The steadiness in John Boy's voice make her open her eyes. His face hovers above her, his cheeks calm, untroubled. Nothing like the twisted agony when he was on the pool table. When she was in charge.

"You see, I promised Darren, just before he got shot, I wouldn't go anywhere near your house. Or you." John Boy shakes his head. "I'm not an animal."

It is Darren's name that makes her believe it. She knows Darren went to see him at Hughie's wake. That Nidge saw Darren talking with John Boy before it happened. It lessens the fear, just a fraction, enough to let the tears stop, but not enough for her to hold her tongue.

"No, but you're sick."

John Boy smiles, but he grips her jaw hard. "I'm not the one who shoved a shillelagh up someone's arse."

Mary swallows; she can't respond to that.

He lets go of her, and stands, and begins to pace. He's still wearing his sweat pants but hasn't put his shirt back on. Through the light gray material, she can see his erection. Her eyes follow him around the bedroom. It is the same pale ice colour as the rest of the apartment. A ceiling to floor glass window to her right looks out over the city. The wall in front of the foot of the bed holds modern art prints of blues, blacks, and grey, with a singular dash of blood red on one in the centre. Though for all the money he has, they may be originals.

When she turns her head to the left, she sees the doorway he dragged her through, and then the mirrored cupboards. Their reflections. Once again, she tenses. But this time from the sight of her bound to the bed, spread-eagled. Her face is a little red, her stomach is quivering, and she sees the small tuft of hair she's left above her labia. Despite Tommy's entreaties for her to shave it all off, she wouldn't go that far. She's not a girl anymore. She sees John Boy's back, and the tattoo in reflection. She repeats the words to herself again.

As John Boy paces, his fingers tap at his lips. Even from her position on the bed, the irises of his eyes are sapphire strong, hard and brilliant. Frightening, for they are full of pleased malevolence. He's plotting, as John Boy always does.

"You know, I meant to keep that promise to your brother. I had no plans to go anywhere near you." John Boy sweeps his gaze over, and she feels like he has her behind glass on the high street; so open, so public. Humiliating. Like when Ma caught her touching herself at age 11, or when that stupid Aaron Murphy pulled up her school dress at 16 and showed the whole school yard her knickers. At least then she had brothers to defend her.

John Boy kneels between her legs, and runs a finger along side her inner left calf. "He just never said what I should do if you came to me. Never said what to do if his big sister came with a fucking shillelagh and murder on her mind."

His tongue flicks out, running over his top lip. A soft red against pink lips, a slash of blood that vanished into his mouth. It's thick, but she thinks it should be slender, and forked.

Suddenly, he surges up, craning over her. His cock, covered by the cotton of the sweatpants, pokes against the lower belly. His face is inches from hers. Mary sneers, and turns away, shutting her eyes, waiting for the inevitable.

She could barely feel the scapular on her chest, but when John Boy raises it, the spot where it lay on her skin becomes as soft as a baby's belly. Her eyes carefully open, and she grimace to see him peering at it, smirking over her breasts

"Darren always said you had a superstitious streak." He holds it up, the picture side of it so she can see the icon of Michael and the Devil. Beneath it is the Latin: Quis ut Deus? _Who is like God?_ "Wearing this make you think you were safe from me? That the sword of Michael would come down between us?" John Boy smirks, and lets it slip. It lands awkwardly between her breasts.

John Boy taps his finger to the cloth, and Mary inhales, a light sucking breath rubbing against her teeth.

"You know about Michael. That we're meant to see him in that moment before we die, before we pass on, and he offers all sinners a chance at redemption."

Mary's breasts heave. She knows this, all of this. She knew the saint's and the angel's names better than anyone in Sunday School.

He traces the line of her collarbone with his fingertip. It's a slippery, slimy sensation. "And then, they tell us, he'll carry our souls all the way up to heaven, to weigh them on scales, perfectly balanced, before God's judgement."

Their eyes meet on the final word. Mary can't see the tattoo now, but it's words burst in view between them.

John Boy shakes his head. "You are not like God, Mary. You cannot judge me. Or anyone else. Darren thought he could, thought he could be the avenging angel." With a leer, he eyes both her breasts. "And we've seen what happens to avenging angels, here on earth. Especially ones who can't make the final kill."

When he blows cold air into the hollow at the base of her throat, her knees shake. Anger, fear, pain, everything that he has said, echoing through her mind. She tried to be like St Michael, tried to take his power, but she couldn't kill John Boy. Wouldn't do it. Thought his agony was plenty. But she so badly misjudged him, and now...he kisses the same hollow, and she winces as if it burns.

"Of course, Darren doesn't believe in anything. Bet you tried. Mary, Mary. The virtuous one, the one to keep them all on the straight and narrow. The wholesome one...so you want us all to think. So where is the father of those girls?"

Mary snaps her head back, eyes flying open in rage. The bastard who fucked off to Limerick, whose name she doesn't speak in front of the girls. "You leave him out of it!"

"Oooh, so you can have us all thinking it was the immaculate conception? Wrong Mary for that."

Mary jerks her body as much as the binds will allow. How dare he make that comparison? "That's blasphemy!"

John Boy blows her a kiss, lips smacking with a sick, wet sound. "All sex is blasphemy." He bends to her ear. "That's what makes it feel so fucking good. Even when it hurts."

Mary swallows, thinking of the horrors of sex the nuns told her of at school, that the priests warned about, that made her frightened and thrilled. Then when it happened, when the first boy she slept with made her come, how she'd never felt as close to God as she did in that moment.

He grasps both her breasts, one in each hand, eyes wide, disgustingly pleased. Mary stares down at them, his fingers pressing into her flesh, furrowing it, almost disappearing. John Boy breaths, a sound that is like a hiss, and when she looks up, he's biting his lower lip, and he rocks against her stomach, his cock harder than before.

"Big tits like yours...no wonder you were knocked up so soon."

"You bastard!" she spits.

John Boy doesn't react to her words at all. He massages her breasts, and she squirms.

Still squeezing, too soft to be painful, too hard to be kind, he says, "Lovely lass, you are. The fair cailín, the little Irish mother..."

One hand reaches up, and the pad of his finger rests on her chin. She'd bite it if it were anywhere near her mouth.

And he sneers again. "Now the little Irish tart, who likes to fuck men up the arse."

The words cut in ways they shouldn't; 'tart' makes her think of the girls who were so desperate for affection they'd do anything, disgracing themselves with cheap perfume and short dresses. The girl she's knows she not, yet she is the girl who tried to make him weep with pleasure and pain underneath her.

He rolls to the right of her, leaving her body once again exposed to the air of the room. Only when it washes cool over her does she realise she's warm. A brief glance to the mirrored side, and she sees she's flushed all over. Next to her John Boy sits up, and their eyes meet in the mirror. He blows a kiss at her, and she rolls her lips together, as if to deflect it.

Then she sees John Boy's hand dip between her legs, and feels the tip of his finger press against her clit. Her head rolls back, eyes to the ceiling, and she gasps as John Boy chuckles, and begins to work at it.

His fingertip is like the point of a blade; it threatens to expose more and more of her. Each press, each flick, brings her closer and closer to coming apart. Mary thrashes away as best as she can. She won't. Not in front of him, not like this. Not by his hand.

Yet he's above her, smug mouth and taunting eyes, snickering low with each quiet sound she's trying not to make. She shuts her eyes not to see him, but not seeing him threatens to overwhelm the the ends of her nerves. Instead, she locks her gaze on him. On that scheming smooth face. The preternaturally dark head with the pale cheeks, and she tries to see the spectre, the ghost...Death. Anything to stop pleasure pulsing through her body. But his fingers are deft, and each movement only brings her nearer to the edge.

"No," she breaths. "No."

"No? Really?"

Mercifully, the rolling finger leaves her clit, but John Boy trails down the lines of her labia, and parts the folds. The gesture releases her wetness. Mary gasps, trembling, scared of her body's reaction. Her thighs are shaking as he so damn softly keeps running up and down the lips, as if coaxing her.

Her gasps start to judder. John Boy makes a sound as if to quiet a crying child.

"Oh Mary. You say no, but your cunt...well..."

He slides one finger into her, and rolls it around. Mary stays very still, hoping not to feel anything but vague movement, and it works. Until John Boy pulls it out, and rubs his now wet finger back on her clit.

"Your cunt is sopping wet."

John Boy's finger rocks back and forth. Mary squeaks, a sound she feels so stupid for making, and John Boy chuckles.

"You were wet when you had me over the table, weren't you? You liked that, right Mary? Liked that I was in pain, but that my dick was hard and I wanted to come."

John Boy pinches her already pointed right nipple. She twitches, and he chuckles, increasing the pressure slowly, not sharply, pushing the hardening teet against her soft areola. It sends a horrible, delicious tingle through her. That he knows just how to tease both her nipple and her clit, that he's making her body feel...so damn _good_...she cries, throat constricted, not caring how like a wounded animal she sounds. She tries again to tug against the binds, but she's bound there, can't get away from him. She can only tilt her hips down, so her labia and clit are away from his fingertip, but the stretch of it against the press of his nail shoots needle-like pleasure from her loins all the way up her back.

John Boy laughs. "And your hips want it too. You know, they say when a woman starts rolling her hips, that's the point she's ready to be fucked?"

"Please...stop..." she whimpers.

"But you're enjoying it so much. I can hear you, I can feel you..." He inhales, and feigns a pleased shiver. "I can even smell how turned on you are."

A hitch in her throat as the shame begins to burn in her. The shame trying to fight the tingling, the rushing waves, her hot blood. The shame blistering against the scapular, lying uselessly on her chest and back.

"Wait. I understand."

John Boy arches up over her like a cobra, and his lips curl outwards, revealing shiny white teeth. Fangs waiting to strike.

"You're humiliated that it's me. That _I'm_ giving you such pleasure. Someone who's so beneath you. Like a little worm under your foot. That's it, isn't it, Mary?"

"No..." she lies. Of course it's a lie. "Please...stop."

His hand leaves her breast and snatches her hair. Nose to nose, John Boy says;

"You want to apologise for before? For giving me that huge fucking hard-on? For making me want to explode all over my fucking pool table? For not giving me that satisfaction you promised?"

His hands stop for a moment. The pause allows Mary to weigh the options in her mind. Yes, she could be contrite. Yes, she could tell him she didn't mean it to happen, that it was spur of the moment, that she'd never considered doing it before she had him over the pool table. She could admit it turned her on in strange ways, that she liked his pain and body writhing like a serpent beneath her hands. But just as she'd promised John Boy to get him off, he too could just continue, even after she told him all this.

When the scales tip over, Mary finds that her pride was stronger than her shame.

She shakes her head. "It was exactly what you had coming to you."

John Boy raises his eyebrows, frowning at first, but then he nods, knowing and impressed.

"Smart girl. Never capitulate. Even when you've spread your legs, and you're being quite literally fucked over."

He kisses her, quick, harsh, before she has a chance to react. Then his mouth darts to her neck. He begins to nuzzle there, but he moves away soon, across to her throat, down her chest and collarbone. She twitches, the wetness of his mouth irksome. When he get to her breasts, he gives each nipple a long, hard suck, peaking them in the wake of his mouth and teeth.

"Such a beautiful girl you are, Mary." His mouth continues to her hip bone, nibbling it, but it stays, and his fingers find her clit once more. Mary keens at the touch. He glances up at her, grinning so wickedly.

"And such lovely sounds you make." He circles her belly button with his tongue, kissing it, before leaning up, and saying, "Now why don't you just relax, and enjoy it."

He returns to teasing her clit and nipple, and again, she tries to fight the feelings. But each stretch and strain from the pleasure she makes, even as the cord digs into her, her limbs are taut like a tightrope, John Boy finds a way to turn it again to something awful and divine. Each time she thinks her breathing is steady so she can exhale against the rolling movements, he speeds up, or slows down, an agonising pace or infuriating rush. Watching him has no effect; seeing his chest begin to heave as he steers her closer to the brink, hearing his own short gasps, only begins to mix with hers.

And when her legs begin to shake, when she looks down and sees her hips are thrusting up to meet his hand, Mary closes her eyes, and bites her lip, trying to still herself one last time, that maybe she won't fall into the abyss he's led her too. John Boy stops, and she thinks its over...but with a single insistent press, Mary comes.

Her hips lift right off the bed. Normally she'd rock back and forth, whole body thrashing, but the cord holds her, forcing her to feel each wave, her limbs not bracing her cunt from the heat. It's like fireworks between her legs, scorching, exploding. Her toes and fingers splay, taking the tingles to the very tips. The only thing she can think is to not let her mouth open, not to scream the orgasm, but she hears the muffled noises she makes, and hears John Boy chanting 'yes, yes, yes',

When it should be over, Mary starts to exhale, but John Boy is still flicking at her throbbing clit. It's tender in the aftermath, and her eyes, wet from the tension, fly open, and she beseeches him.

"No, please, it's too – "

"A little more, Mary. Now there's a good girl." He bites down on her nipple, and she squeaks.

Each flick sends another shock, almost unbearable but also blinding like heaven, and each time she says no, but John Boy keeps going, until her clit is numb, and her body refuses to take anything else. Only then John Boy lets go of her.

He stands up, stretching his fingers, back straight and proud. Bastard, she thinks.

"You loved every second of that." John Boy purses his lips, mocking as ever, shaking his head. "You're really more of a whore than I thought."

The words stung before; now Mary can wear them. She swallows, trying to bring her throbbing body back to normal, fast, not to bask in the aftermath.

She says, "Well, we're even now. You can let me go."

John Boy's brow furrows. After a moment, he shakes his head. He leaves the bedroom, but is back in less than 30 seconds, holding her hand bag.

Mary can't stop herself from say 'oh fuck' when he reaches in, and pulls out the shillelagh, dropping the bag at the same time.

"That was your turn. Now I get to finish mine." John Boy grabs his cock through the material, and rubs it, then he yanks down his sweatpants, and steps out of them. His cock springs free, like a pointed piece of ivory, though engorged with blood at the head. "Because I still have a nice big bone for a dirty little bitch."

All this time, Mary hasn't prayed. But as John Boy comes closer to the bed, in her mind, she starts.

 _Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..._

She jerks against the binds, but it's as futile as before, and he goes to her right side, and unlashes her wrist and ankle there.

 _Blessed art thou among women..._

Free now, Mary tries to fight, but she shoves her onto her side, forcing her to face the mirror. She sees her sweaty chest and stomach, the stickiness of her cunt. The thin string of the scapular, the cloth bisecting her breasts. Sees John Boy looming over her, a vampire intent on her body.

 _...and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus._

John Boy runs the shillelagh's round head down her cheek. Mary winces, sure he's going to swing it back and hit her.

 _Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinner's now..._

Instead, he says, "Nice of you to wash it before putting it away. Tidying up after yourself. Good girl, Mary."

 _...and at the hour of our death._

Then he hooks his arm under her thigh, lifts it up to open her legs, and pushes the shillelagh's head against her cunt. It's only seconds before her resistance ends and he rams it all the way inside her.

She watches it all happen in the mirror.

Mary cries out. She hasn't had time to think if it will hurt, but she's so wet that her cunt is ready to accept it. It's bigger than any cock she's ever taken. The bulbous head stretches her inside, and the polished nobs press against the walls of her channel. Not painful, instead spreading her more than she ever thought possible, pushing against the parts inside her that send sparks through her body. John Boy pumps his hand a little, the head and nobs rubbing her with that lulling tension that penetration always brings.

He continues. When she's mewling, John Boy pushes it in a little deeper, and lets go. He winks at her in the mirror, and reaches between her legs from behind. His fingers catch her sticky juices – there is so much of it, a near flood – and he brings it behind her, up between the cheeks of her arse. He rubs it against her hole, and Mary knows what's come next. Despite knowing it's inevitable, she tenses.

John Boy bends, kisses her shoulder, and still grinning at her in the mirror, he angles his cock to her hole. Mary swallows, and watches it between her legs, along side the end of the shillelagh.

"You're so wet," he says, as the head pushes past the ring of muscle, and she starts to wail, "that I don't need to spit."

He slides the length of it into her. Shockingly easy, but the pain still courses her. Her now free hand scrunches the sheets, her knuckles turning as white as John Boy's skin. She pants, high-pitch and sharp pants, and John Boy's eye lids flutter, his mouth gaping open, emitting a deep moan that she feels in her own belly.

"Fuck...yes..." He elongates the final 's' into a hiss. "Mary...oh fuck...sweet Mary, oh Mother of God...you're so slick, so tight."

Mary curses God for her unanswered prayer, curses St Michael between her breasts for abandoning her, but when John Boy withdraws, and thrusts in again, it makes her body jerk, and this time, the pain is less.

John Boy takes hold of the wood inside her again, and after a few experiments, finds a rhythm, thrusting in and out of her with his cock, and pumping the shillelagh back and forth. Mary keeps panting, but now in a low tone, deep as she opens her mouth to breath in, to adjust her body to the dual sensation of wood and cock, of feeling full and tender and tingling, of being spread apart by John Boy, whose taunting ministrations are singeing the ends of her nerves, making her come apart as he fucks her deep and hard, repeating her name over and over. She begins to cry, and it's not from pain, or humiliation. It's because she wants it all to end, and she wants it to never stop. Because her first orgasm brought her closer to God, and this is dragging her straight to Hell.

And all the time she watches in the mirror. Hell was supposed to be a pit of fire and body wracking pain. Only pain. Not exquisite, primal torment in a cave of ice. But she's trapped herself in this cave, with this white demon tormenting her with her own body's betrayal, with her weapon of choice, filling her with it and with his own body. In the mirror, she watches John Boy writhe against her, and behind and over her, feels his slick skin, the hairs on his chest, rubbing her back. She feels his cock impaling her arse, and in reflection, it is a blur of serpentine strikes.

Then he lets go of the shillelagh, and throws himself over her, grabbing her breast, head against her shoulder. Mary stuns herself when she takes the shillelagh in her hand, continues the pumping he began, falls into the rhythm he made, and sense that her whole body is now moving as one with him. Letting him devour her, prey vanishing inside the boa's mouth, the vampire's victim succumbing to his bite.

This time, when she comes, it starts inside her, but where she cannot tell. Only that she sees herself shatter in the mirror, bursting not with blood, but like glacial ice. And above her, clinging to her now as if she were a rock in a stormy sea, John Boy arches his neck, and groans. His thrusts quicken, and she sees the straining in his neck, the muscles and the veins and the arteries; she can almost see the blood rushing beneath his skin. It is bestial, ethereal...yet all too human. Mary closes her eyes, and rides with him to the end.

When it is over, John Boy sags over her. His cock slips out of her arse, and she shivers as his cum does too. Mary eases out the shillelagh, and once it's back in her hand, she looks at it, dripping with her cum, shiny black. She throws it to the ground, but she has no energy, and it thuds dully against the carpet.

In the mirror, two sweaty, spent figures look back at her and John Boy. The woman, her blonde hair in disarray, lying beneath the man, has red wet eyes, and her wrist and ankle are bound to the bed posts. She almost forgot she was tied down. Her breasts now hide the cloth of the scapular, like it's buried in her chest. The man, sprawled above her, with his too evenly coloured hair, matted against his forehead...his eyes too are wet, and bloodshot. His face, usually so smooth, and held with purpose, is broken.

Mary blinks, and takes a deep breath. As she does, John Boy leans up, and puts his mouth to her ear.

"Hughie was a fucking idiot."

Mary's eyes widen, and she starts to speak, but John Boy puts his hand to her mouth.

"He was a clown who half the time couldn't tell his arse from his elbow. He didn't listen to the simplest, clearest instructions. He was a fucking wild pig who didn't know when to get his nose out of the trough."

John Boy's words are hoarse, and he turns her head to make her look at him; not the mirror, but his own watery blue eyes. He shook her, firm, though not vicious.

"But he was still my brother. Not only a half brother, my _brother_ , my fucking blood. And he...loved life in ways I'll never know how." John Boy swallows, and he squeezes his eyes closed. His face is wracked, twisted like a tortured ghoul. "And since my mother was a slag, his mother a social climbing whore, and our Da spoke the loudest with his fists, he was all I fucking had."

He may be above her, and she is still half tied to the bed, but as John Boy starts to tremble, Mary knows she is stronger. In that moment, she is so much stronger than he. With her free hand, Mary eases his away from her mouth.

"And you loved him," she says.

John Boy sobs, and his head drops to her chest, his body boneless, clinging to her. Her fingers thread through his hair. It is soft, silky even with the sweat.

Mary quietly adds, "Like I love mine."

John Boy raises his head. There are tears all over his face. He looks like an old man and a young boy at the same time, and Mary, seeing her own grief for Robbie and her fears for Darren in his features, also begins to weep.

He unbinds her from the bed, but free at last, she doesn't leave. Instead, she holds him to her breast, and both of them sob.

*

They sit inches apart on the couch, hair wet from the shower, each with a cigarette in hand. They're dressed; Mary's clothes were not torn, though her dress is a little stretched.

There was blood in the bed sheets afterwards. His, not hers, from when she first did him over on the pool table. They helped each other into the shower. The head was fitted to the ceiling in the stall, and the water fell down on their heads like rain. It washed away the blood, the cum, the sweat, as they both still clung to each other. They kissed each other, nuzzled. Mary remembers most the warmness of his white flesh, soft when she ran her lips over his shoulder.

They dried each other with soft grey towels. John Boy even tried to wring water out of the scapular, but Mary shook her head, and pulled it off. She left it on his bedside table.

John Boy hasn't finished his cigarette when he tips a small white dot of coke onto the side of his hand, and inhales it. He looks at Mary, hollow eyed, as if daring her to ask for it, or to tell him off for using.

Mary gives him a faltering smile. "Only God can judge you."

An amused snort, and he nods.

Mary takes another drag of her smoke, stubs it out, and stands to go. On the dining table, he's left not only written instructions of how to find Stumpy – she'd forgotten the address, after everything – but also advice on how best to take care of him. Next to it is her handbag, and the shillelagh, now cleaned of all evidence of how they used and abused it.

"Use it wisely," he says, not looking at her.

Her hand hovers at first, but he shoves both paper and wood into her handbag. As she leaves, she stops, and stares at the back of his head.

When he was a ghost, he had power. When he took her, swelling her body with rage and lust and filling it with his anger and his cock, he became a demon, more powerful than any ghost she could have conjured.

But now she looks at him, as a man, whose slippery features hide a both a monster and a child, and she sees his dark head, smaller than before, and at the nape of his neck, the red blood beneath his white skin.

–  
End


End file.
